By Antoinette WinklerPrins, AAG Council Treasurer

This is the second of a short series of perspectives by 2024-2026 Council Treasurer Antoinette WinklerPrins—a series designed to help illuminate some of the financial challenges a professional organization such as the AAG faces. In this column, she offers information about the costs of managing a hybrid annual meeting, such as the one AAG has supported since 2023. Read the first installment.

When the pandemic started, we all learned quickly how to use virtual meeting tools to continue to do knowledge work, and to connect socially.  COVID-related social distancing forced us into the virtual meeting space, yet we soon realized that virtual access created opportunities for participation and engagement that had not been available before—a very positive outcome of a disruptive global event.  Since we emerged from the pandemic, the expectation for a virtual option for any meetings is more prevalent, and organizations are responding in varied ways. AAG is one of the relatively few professional organizations that remains committed to a synchronous hybrid annual meeting.

We are making this commitment to make sure this important professional event is accessible to those who cannot travel or who make a personal choice to not travel. At a larger scale, we are also committed to lowering the carbon footprint of our meetings. (We are on track to reduce meeting-related emissions by 45% by 2030.)

Members are sometimes surprised that the virtual option does not result in a lower cost for the meeting, including registration. After all, a virtual meeting seems to be less complicated than traveling in person.  Isn’t it less costly, too?

Unfortunately, no. Let me explain.

Two Words: Tech and Labor

While the participation and engagement components of virtual or hybrid meetings are positive, lower cost is not one of the benefits. The benefits of virtual or hybrid meetings come at a cost, chiefly for technology and in labor.

Tech: The ability to hold a virtual or hybrid meeting depends on technology and IT support to ensure that all functions smoothly.  AAG carefully researches and combines the most complementary and budget-friendly services and platforms possible to support its hybrid meetings, from the platform that hosts meeting submissions and all video-streamed sessions to integrations with meeting software onsite. In addition, hardware is needed: up-to-date computers, video screens, microphones, and equipment with recording capabilities for room set up. There are also critical aspects of a hybrid meeting that are easy to overlook but need a modest financial investment, notably online helpdesk software to approximate in-person responses to questions at registration.

Labor: Qualified people need to be available to run it all, at a scale serving many thousands of participants simultaneously. Both on- and offsite IT assistance is needed, and must be staffed by people who are adept at monitoring and troubleshooting for live gatherings simultaneously with livestreaming for virtual guests.  Skilled labor is the single most important expenditure for a meeting, and is also the most direct way for AAG’s economic activity to benefit people, be it our local host location or offsite locations. Paying fair wages for this expertise is critical: meeting rooms with a hybrid component are a complex visual and aural experience. Virtual meetings, too, are not as simple as “plug and play.” These rooms must be monitored in case of a variety of challenges, from technical issues to participant safety and security. Virtual and hybrid sessions raise the possibility of having to troubleshoot with participants using older versions of applications and programs; this can take a lot of time. Onsite, coordinating with hotels and conference center staff can also add to the cost of labor to support a hybrid meeting.

Cost Proportions for Hybrid Meetings

On the basis of AAG’s 2023 and 2024 meetings, we’ve found that registrations for the virtual option cover roughly one-half of its costs. Virtual registration fees contributed about 12% of meeting revenues at the 2023 Annual Meeting, while virtual services accounted for 24% of total meeting costs. In Honolulu, the proportion was similar: 9% revenue to 18% of costs.

The costs above don’t just represent the sessions that occur online. Also included are the costs of live-streaming in-person sessions and providing meeting presenters with the opportunity to hold hybrid sessions (virtual presenter in a streamed in-person session). Since major keynotes and panels are live-streamed, these are the events that make a hybrid conference feel like one conference, instead of two parallel and unequal experiences in-person and online.

We believe the value of maintaining a hybrid and virtual option for the annual meeting transcends the bottom line. Hybrid is the best possible way to make sure the meeting is accessible, not only for those who can register at in-person rates and travel, but for members who cannot travel or wish to reduce their climate impact. It also contributes significantly to AAG’s efforts to shrink our carbon footprint, combined with supportive innovations such as the development of regional nodes that connect with the main meeting.

The annual meeting means a lot to all of us: a time to gather, share knowledge, network, and grow the discipline. When we set new registration fees, we were careful not to do so in a “one size fits all” way. We set the new fees for a proportional cost sharing, rather than trying to pass on all costs to members.  We hope this creates the best possible value for our members at a financially sustainable cost. For all of us.

Please feel free to reach out to me or Gary Langham, AAG’s ED with questions, comments, or concerns. Send your comments and questions with the subject line “Treasurer’s Corner” to [email protected].

By Antoinette WinklerPrins, AAG Council Treasurer

This is the first of a short series of perspectives by 2024-2026 Council Treasurer Antoinette WinklerPrins. In this first column, she offers the overview of AAG’s recovery and lessons from the hard hits of COVID-19 and annual meeting cancellations. Future columns will look at topics from a member’s perspective—Have you ever wondered why having a conference hotel is so important? What the costs for a hybrid or virtual meeting are? Dr. WinklerPrins will take up those questions in future issues of the Newsletter.

When I stepped up to become AAG’s Council Treasurer this year, I had already been a devoted member of AAG for more than 25 years, and had served on the AAG Council since 2023, and as East Lakes Regional Councilor from 2009-2012. Now I am fulfilling the position of Treasurer, learning more every day about what it entails. It is teaching me valuable lessons that I’d like to share with you about how I and the rest of the AAG Council can serve you, the AAG members. Becoming Treasurer has also given me a sense of purpose to explain aspects of AAG’s budgetary and fiscal responsibilities that help provide context for AAG’s decisions on members’ behalf.

In my professional life, I am a geographer serving as the Deputy Division Director of the Division of Behavioral and Cognitive Sciences in the Directorate for Social, Behavioral, and Economic Sciences at the U.S. National Science Foundation. I served as a Program Director in the Geography and Spatial Science/Human-Environmental and Geographical Sciences prior to becoming a Deputy Division Director. I have served on the faculty of Michigan State University and retain an adjunct appointment at the Johns Hopkins University’s Environmental Sciences and Policy Program.

As a member of AAG, I already understood that the governing body of the AAG, the AAG Council, has fiduciary responsibility for the organization. As Treasurer, I have come to appreciate the considerable time that the Council devotes to reviewing the state of AAG financials during each of its meetings.  I have learned how to work closely with the AAG Executive Director and Director of Finance and Accounting, and how to head the AAG Finance Committee.

When I joined Council in July 2023, AAG was emerging from the worst of the pandemic and absorbing the costs of cancelling three in-person meetings in a row. Along with that loss came significant investment in hosting virtual meetings. Because the Annual Meeting has long been the AAG’s main source of revenue, these three years of cancelled meetings were very hard on the financial wellbeing of the organization.

One of the major shifts AAG made soon after the pandemic was not only fiscally sound but in line with its climate goals: the move to a new headquarters that is LEED Gold and highly rated for accessibility and walkability. AAG’s staff work hybrid schedules to reduce trips, and the move resulted in a significant rainy day fund from the sale of the old headquarters.

In 2023, Council approved several more steps to stabilize AAG:

• Membership dues were increased on July 1, after a six-week campaign to make sure current members had the chance to renew at existing rates and take advantage of multi-year membership for up to three years. AAG had not increased membership dues since 2008, even though inflation-linked incremental increases are the norm in many organizations such as the AAG. This adjustment has aligned dues with current costs for member services—and AAG added two discounted membership categories for faculty and staff of Minority-Serving Institutions and K-12 teachers.
• AAG has adopted a break-even model for registration pricing for its annual meeting, opting to retain the hybrid option for maximum choices for all members. To reflect the true costs of a hybrid option while protecting discounted rates as much as possible, AAG raised registration rates, but not uniformly across all categories. Additional discount categories were added here, also.
• AAG reluctantly undertook a staff reduction last summer to reduce fixed costs, and has sought other cost-cutting opportunities in its operating expenses.
• Because many of AAG’s fiscal measures will take time to have full effect, the Association has needed to use money from Council-restricted reserves to make up the shortfalls. Now, AAG must shift emphasis and rebuild these reserves. Therefore, September, Council voted to prioritize building up our reserves and endowment again before embarking on costly or risky initiatives.
• As part of its work to diversify revenue beyond the annual meeting, AAG has embarked on a major internal effort to seek and secure grants. Two projects—the Convening of Care and the new GAIA project—have already received funding from the National Science Foundation, with eight more proposals currently in play.

I am confident in the management of AAG and can assure you that the decisions the Council has made recently are stabilizing AAG’s financials, ensuring the organization’s continued viability. Plans for prudent fiscal management for the next few years are critical to helping the organization build up future reserves so that it can sustain its important work supporting its members and the discipline of geography. We appreciate your patience and understanding as we rebuild. Please feel free to reach out to me or Gary Langham, AAG’s ED with questions, comments, or concerns. Send your comments and questions with the subject line “Treasurer’s Corner” to [email protected].